KØS special museum of art in public places - Køge

KØS is the Danish special museum of art in public places. The museum has existed since 1977 and is located with its museum shop and café in Nørregade pedestrian street in the heart of charming Køge.

Being Denmark's only museum of the art we all know from our urban spaces, hospitals, castles, churches and other public places, KØS has a character of its own.

KØS does not collect and exhibit the finished works of art displayed in public places. But in the same way as museums of architecture, which do not "collect" the finished buildings, the museum's collection includes more than 7,000 drawings, models and other preparatory studies for these very special works of art.

Among the museum's highlights are Bjørn Nørgaard's sketches for the Queen's gobelins at Christiansborg Palace. The 17 huge, coloured cartoons and a number of other sketches for the gobelins are on view on the museum's attractive top floor as are films about the production process etc. The collection includes works by a large number of illustrious Danish artists, the list going back as far as Constantin Hansen's preparatory works for the decoration of Copenhagen University in the 19th century, Edvard Eriksen's original plaster model of "The Little Mermaid" from 1910, up to Gunnar Westmann's popular animal sculptures and Per Kirkeby's sketches for works like his huge decoration of the Geological Museum in 2004. Experimental contemporary artists are also represented in the collection, e.g. Thomas FOS Poulsen's ”Oslo Bar” from 1999, an experiment in the so-called ”social sculpture", and most recently KØS has received a donation from ten of Denmark's leading contemporary artists in the form of the sketches and models used for the comprehensive redecoration of the Crown Prince Couple's residence at Amalienborg Palace. ---KØS ist das dänische Spezialmuseum für Kunst im öffentlichen Raum. Das Museum existiert seit 1977 und befindet sich mit Museumsladen und Café in der Fuβgängerstraβe Nørregade im Herzen der gemütlichen Stadt Køge.